ABSTRACT
This chapter presents the outcome of a specific attempt to translate the working idea of a female environment into an area of vital social service need for women. Women in Transition was specifically set up to house women and their children who have been forced to suddenly depart their homes and who must confront marital breakdown and single-support parenthood against the backdrop of immediate homelessness. Women in Transition, like so many current Canadian innovative services, was initiated through a federal government Local Initiatives Program grant. Data collected at Women in Transition over the past year show that the typical resident is Canadian and in her mid-twenties. After a six-week stay at Women in Transition, approximately a quarter of the women go back to their husbands, but most continue to live alone with their children and move into small apartments, attend job-retraining courses, and organize day-care services.
